Many furnishings, such as those used in the home and office, are desired with surfaces that are very smooth. Table tops and counters are often desired to have a very smooth surface, such as a highly polished surface, particularly for sanitary and aesthetic purposes. Many devices and methods are known for producing a very smooth finish on a table or counter top. A workpiece for a table or counter top, can either be made with a smooth finish, or the surface can be treated to produce the smooth surface.
A common method for smoothing a rough workpiece, is to move an abrasive over the surface of the workpiece in order to wear down the surface of the workpiece. This wearing down, first removes raised portions of the surface which cause the roughness. These removed portions, need to be removed from the abrasive, so that they do not clog the abrasive and reduce the effectiveness of the abrasive. The removed portions of the workpiece form a dust. This dust often becomes airborne and can cause health problems, as well as interfere with the finishing operation, and interfere with the surrounding environment.
Because a smooth surface requires very little variation between the high and low points on the surface, the abrasive material must be course to fine in order to achieve the desired smoothness. For very smooth surfaces, the abrasive particles must be very fine and can only remove a very small amount of workpiece surface with each movement. A very smooth surface thus requires much relative movement between the abrasive and the workpiece. Also the relative movement must be applied evenly across the entire surface to have a uniform finish and to have the surface be substantially flat. The large number of repetitive motions, as well as the need to have a uniform and flat surface, causes surface finishing to be very labor intensive, especially for large surfaces.
New materials for table and counter tops, such as CORIAN.RTM. are very desirable, and are known as solid surface materials. This solid surface material is manufactured most economically in large surface areas, and with a rough surface. Because of the large amount of labor needed to smooth the surface, and the high level of skill required to perform a uniform flat surface, surface finishing is usually only performed once the workpiece has been cut to its final size. Even then surface finishing is a significant task. Surface finishing needs to be done at those facilities where the individual pieces of furniture are manufactured. This requires a sizable investment by a furniture manufacture and contributes to the final cost of a piece of furniture.